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Discusses how vulnerable lockers are to vandalism and thieves, offering examples from various athletic facilities of both forcible and "light-fingered" theft. (EV)

Discusses the latest in school restroom and locker room design, such as wash facilities in outside corridors, infrared water control, repositioned mirrors, plastic lockers and benches, and multiple-head showers. These innovations are designed to address cost, maintenance, and security concerns. (EV)

Responds to a critique of "Fraternal Bonding in the Locker Room: A Profeminist Analysis of Talk about Competition and Women," defending its pro-feminist perspective, describing research methodology and follow-up research with one of the athletes from the original study; revisiting three of the original talk fragments; and commenting on the relative merits of conversation analysis versus a pro-feminist approach. (SM)

Reexamines the 15 talk fragments in "Fraternal Bonding in the Locker Room: A Profeminist Analysis of Talk about Competition and Women" (Curry, 1991), which epitomizes how sociologists utilize talk. The author examines the utterances and finds that 9 fragments reveal some dissent in how listeners react to crass talk, arguing that sport talk should be analyzed using conversation analysis. (SM)

Examines how today's college and university athletic locker rooms have become sophisticated recruiting tools that rival many professional facilities. Locker room design and location and their level of furniture, finishes, and equipment are discussed as is the trend for more environmentally friendly locker rooms. (GR)

Offers advice on heavy-use locker-room design that provides easier maintenance and vandal resistance. Design features and materials used for flooring, ceilings, and walls are addressed as are built-in systems and equipment, toilet and shower fixtures and partitions, lockers, and mechanical and electrical systems. (GR)

Discusses locker-room design standards and common challenges when complying with the Americans with Disabilities Act. Accessibility and safety considerations for shower, toilet, and locker areas are addressed, as are entrance vestibules, drying and grooming areas, and private dressing rooms. (GR)

Explains how daily maintenance and design planning can reduce the potential safety hazards found in athletic-facility locker rooms. Topics include designing locker rooms for visual openness and traffic control, providing non-slip surfaces and proper drainage, installing ventilation systems that can handle the moisture produced in locker rooms, maintaining cleanliness for a healthy environment, and planning for bench type and placement. (GR)

Discusses the selection criteria for athletic-facility locker-room flooring that will provide safety, ease of maintenance, and cost savings. Comparative comments are provided on ceramic tile, carpeting, epoxy quartz, coated concrete, rubber flooring, flow-thru tile, and terrazzo. (GR)

Discusses athletic facility design and renovation issues that exist because of increasing numbers of female athletes. Outlines renovation issues such as locker room facilities, space for sports equipment, and additional athletic fields. (GR)

Examines the difficulties and solutions to wet environment repairs in pools and locker rooms. Issues include crack and leak repairs, repairs to grout and tile, on-deck accessories, and underwater lights. Several "tricks-of-the-trade" notes are included as is a brief discussion on emergency shutdowns. (GR)

Discusses techniques to help create clean and inviting school locker rooms. Daily, weekly or monthly, biannual, and annual cleaning strategies for locker room showers are highlighted as are the specialized maintenance needs for aerobic and dance areas, running tracks, and weight training areas. (GR)

Describes how barracks renovations at West Point have included the replacement of privacy partitions and screens in restrooms and locker rooms with items of high-density polyethylene (HDPE), which is more durable than metal. (EV)

Discusses planning, specification, and installation of student lockers, asserting that for the two basic types of lockers, corridor student lockers and athletic lockers, design considerations must focus on space requirements and ease of supervision. Discusses centralized versus decentralized configuration and locker size and type. Includes a chart of common dressing room locker types and sizes. (EV)

Examines how careful attention to the design and maintenance of locker rooms can not only contain odors, but greatly enhance a facility's image. Locker systems, flooring options, ventilation, and cleaning regimens are addressed. (GR)

Discusses the need to reexamine school locker rooms built before the women's sports boom to determine if they need to comply with Title IX standards. Some tangible evidence of Title IX problems are explored along with some of the struggles a few high schools have had when their male oriented locker rooms were found not to be in compliance.(GR)

Examines techniques for keeping college fitness centers secure while maintaining an inviting atmosphere. Building access control, preventing locker room theft, and suppressing causes for physical violence are discussed. (GR)

Discusses the types of washroom fixtures and locker room equipment that can help minimize and discourage student mischief. Topics include germ control by avoiding the use of tile grout and substituting epoxy paint, using phenolic toilet-stall partitions to reduce vandalism, and using expanded metal lockers to control locker odor. (GR)

Examines the concept of shared-use facilities to help financially support and meet the demand for athletic facilities. Shared-use considerations are explored including cost sharing of ongoing operations, aesthetics, locker rooms, support facilities, parking and site access, and building access and security. (GR)

Explains how proper athletic facility locker-room design can save time and money. Design factors that address who will be using the facility are discussed as are user requirements, such as preparation areas, total storage area per user, grooming area, and security areas. Final comments address maintenance and operations issues. (GR)

Explores locker-room design concepts that can be used to accommodate multipurpose athletic facilities and make the locker room more efficient and user friendly. Spaces are described that can be added to the typical locker room that will complement expanding facility functions. (GR)

Discusses the special indoor air quality issues confronting school gyms, locker rooms, and pools; and explores ways to keep the indoor environment healthy. Included are discussions of mold and fungus control and air issues stemming from indoor pools. (GR)

Examines the trends in college and university sports and recreation center locker rooms as envisioned by a specialist. Features of the modern locker room and the different levels of locker room design are explained. Final comments discuss whether college and university facility managers are inclined to move to high-end locker rooms. (GR)

Owing to their ability for fast switching and the large property contrast between the crystalline and amorphous states that permits multi-level data storage, in-memory computing and neuromorphic computing, the investigation of phase change materials (PCMs) remains a highly active field of research. Yet, the continuous increase in electrical resistance (called drift) observed in the amorphous phase has so far hindered the commercial implementation of multi-level data storage. It was recently shown that the resistance drift is caused by aging-induced structural relaxation of the glassy phase, which is accompanied by a simultaneous decrease in enthalpy and fictive temperature. This implies that resistance is related to enthalpy relaxation. While the resistance is known to drift even at room temperature and below, evidence for enthalpy relaxation at room temperature in amorphous PCMs is still missing. Here, we monitor changes in enthalpy induced by long-term room-temperature aging in a series of PCMs. Our results demonstrate the simultaneity of resistance drift and enthalpy relaxation at room temperature, and thus provide further insights into the mechanism of resistance drift and its possible remediation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present a study on nanoscale skyrmionic spin textures in , a rare-earth complex noncollinear ferromagnet. We confirm, using X-ray microscopy, that can host lattices of metastable skyrmion bubbles at room temperature in the absence of a magnetic field, after applying a suitable field cooling protocol. The skyrmion bubbles are robust against temperature changes from room temperature to 330 K. Furthermore, the skyrmion bubbles can be distorted, deformed, and recovered by varying strength and orientation of the applied magnetic field. We have used nitrogen-vacancy nanoscale magnetic imaging to estimate and map the magnetic stray fields originating from our lamella samples and find stray field magnitudes on the order of a few mT near the sample surface. Micromagnetic simulations show an overall agreement with the observed behaviour of the sample under different magnetic field protocols. We also find that the presence of the Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction is not required to reproduce our experimental results. Its inclusion in the simulation leads to a reversal of the skyrmionic object core polarity, which is not experimentally observed. Our results further corroborate the stability and robustness of the skyrmion bubbles formed in and their potential for future spintronic applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Jean-Pierre Mocky's À mort l'arbitre ! (1984) is an interesting example of French sports fiction. It takes us back into French post-Giscardian society, where people lived under the threat of structural unemployment and in fear of a precarious personal and family life. This context allows us to better understand how exacerbated militancy developed among the fans of a sport as popular as football. À mort l'arbitre ! tells the story of a referee who was chased by a group of fans, intoxicated with frustration and rage after he awarded a penalty to the other team. Waylaid outside the locker room, stalked in a supermarket, and attacked at his home, the referee had no alternative but to go through this nightmarish odyssey to the end. The aim of this article is to analyse the political, cultural, and social meaning of fan violence towards football referees during the 1980s. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present a study on nanoscale skyrmionic spin textures in , a rare-earth complex noncollinear ferromagnet. We confirm, using X-ray microscopy, that can host lattices of metastable skyrmion bubbles at room temperature in the absence of a magnetic field, after applying a suitable field cooling protocol. The skyrmion bubbles are robust against temperature changes from room temperature to 330 K. Furthermore, the skyrmion bubbles can be distorted, deformed, and recovered by varying strength and orientation of the applied magnetic field. We have used nitrogen-vacancy nanoscale magnetic imaging to estimate and map the magnetic stray fields originating from our lamella samples and find stray field magnitudes on the order of a few mT near the sample surface. Micromagnetic simulations show an overall agreement with the observed behaviour of the sample under different magnetic field protocols. We also find that the presence of the Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction is not required to reproduce our experimental results. Its inclusion in the simulation leads to a reversal of the skyrmionic object core polarity, which is not experimentally observed. Our results further corroborate the stability and robustness of the skyrmion bubbles formed in and their potential for future spintronic applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the COVID-19 pandemic, meatpacking workers were disproportionately affected by disease. Large outbreaks at meatpacking facilities resulted in loss of life and threatened the well-being of workers across the globe. Much work was done throughout the pandemic to understand and prevent these outbreaks. This study combined ventilation system evaluation and measurement of human-generated respiratory aerosol to investigate and identify areas of highest risk for disease transmission. These findings confirm that improved ventilation reduces exposure to human-generated aerosols in meatpacking facilities, including those that may contain infectious agents, such as SARS-CoV-2. This study suggests areas of greatest risk are likely areas where workers break from work, such as cafeterias and locker rooms, where ventilation is poorer, use of face masks is reduced, and people congregate. Furthermore, these findings also suggest that ventilation of production areas of the plant, which have been designed for food safety, is sufficient to reduce exposures and likely contributes to reduced transmission in those spaces. Based on these findings, two controls should be prioritized to minimize the likelihood of exposure to potentially infectious aerosols: (1) improving mechanical ventilation and/or adding mitigation strategies such as media filters, germicidal ultraviolet, and other air cleaning technology and (2) applying administrative practices that minimize large congregations of people in poorly ventilated spaces. Importantly, this work demonstrates a method for in situ measurements of human-generated particles that can be used more broadly to understand exposure and risk in various occupied spaces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background/Objectives: Fungal infections, commonly referred to as mycoses, are widespread and affect various parts of the body. Common types of fungal skin infections include tinea pedis, tinea unguim, tinea cruris, tinea versicolor, and tinea manuum. Athletes, in particular, are at a higher risk of contracting these infections due to several factors inherent to their training and competitive environments. Methods: This research examined the incidence, anatomical distribution, and seasonal occurrence of fungal skin infections among beach volleyball athletes in Greece. The study cohort consisted of 785 participants, with an average age of 28.4 years. Variables recorded included gender, the seasonal periods during which athletes might be more prone to injuries, and the specific body areas affected by fungal infections. In addition, training-related data such as weekly training frequency, and daily training duration were collected. Results: Incidence rates correlated in relation to gender: male, tinea pedis (p < 0.000), tinea manuum (p < 0.010); number of weekly trainings: tinea pedis (p < 0.000), tinea unguium (p < 0.043), tinea cruris (p < 0.008), tinea versicolor (p < 0.038), tinea manuum (p < 0.043); average hours of daily training: tinea unguium (p < 0.039), tinea manuum (p < 0.039). Conclusions: Athletic activities often involve exposure to warm, moist conditions that promote fungal growth. Locker rooms, showers, and equipment can harbor fungi, spreading infections among athletes. Understanding these infections is essential for effective prevention and management, as they can impact performance and health if untreated. Proper hygiene, antifungal treatments, and public health measures are crucial to reducing the risk in athletic settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]